The hidden face of search

Not quite there yet but O so much closer. Google has very quietly introduced a face recognition algorithm to their image search. No,no,no, it doesn’t recognize who is in a photograph yet. However what it does, it recognizes if there is a face in the photograph. Baby steps.

Here is how it works. In Google Image, do a search on any subject you would like. Type in “blue” for example. You get as a result a series of blue skies and in your url something like this :

Obviously, since there is no options on the interface to generate this filter, it is not ready for launch yet. And all it currently does is recognize the shape of a face, not who is in the picture. That is still in the works but not very far from being ready.

A life saver for editorial photo agencies, a complete face recognition system with identification would reduce the key wording time to almost nothing and accelerate time to desktop.
Since Google sets the standard in search, you could expect image buyers to soon come to your website expecting the same ability.